Archive for February, 2012

Recently we did a market research on ecommerce and other online commerce platforms and solutions. We will provide the full report in some parts. Here is the first one.

Introduction

Every company is moving online and the reasons are obvious. Lower set-up and operational costs, wider reach, increased customer information, 24 hour business, no middlemen, competing with big organizations are some of them. At first glance the ecommerce website functionality seems pretty straight forward all almost commoditized. All websites have product catalogs from where customers can search what they want, have detailed products information pages, have shopping carts where the products are added and secured payment portals where the users can pay via multiple options. But it is not as easy as it appears. Below that expected looking website lies a complex set of capabilities that are required to keep the web store performing. Not many have been able to achieve it!

Do you also face the problem of abandoned shopping carts? Do you also get frequent complaints of the ineffective search capability or a tedious checkout process on your website? Do you also face the problem of lack of control over processes? Do you also face the problem of having a lot of customer data, but you don’t know what to make of it?

Whereas some organizations are breaking newer grounds in e-commerce, some traditional organizations are struggling to implement even the most critical e-commerce capabilities that could enrich the customer experience. A lot of businesses are moving online and the number of vendors, the number of ownership options and the number of platforms are all increasing. The result is an increase in investment and competition to take the advantage this market has to offer. According to the Internet Retailer’s magazine, the top 500 retailers of North America sold $150 billion worth of goods and services in 2010, up by 18% of their 2009 sales. (Internet Retailer Magazine’s Top 500 Guide,” 2011 Edition). The demand for custom ecommerce solution continues to grow.